The building work in Crossway and Broadway will not start until businesses leave Charles Square after Christmas

The start of building work on Bracknell's much-vaunted town centre regeneration will be delayed due to work on utilities and highways taking longer than expected.

Landlord Bracknell Regeneration Partnership (BRP) said the roadworks around The Ring in Bracknell will now finish in the autumn.

Building work in the area which used to be Crossway and Broadway will now not begin until after the busy Christmas period, following a consultation with traders.

Piles of rubble have remained around the town since the demolition of Broadway and Crossway last year, which has led some Bracknell Times readers to question whether the project had stalled.

Helen Barnett, of BRP, strongly denied rumours one of the major backers of the scheme had pulled out and insists work is carrying on as planned, but admitted the delay to the work on the roads around the town will have a knock-on effect.

She said, while there is no exact start date for the work, it will take two years to complete.

The roadworks are around The Ring to allow contractors to put in all the utilities, such as electricity and water, to be installed.

Ms Barnett said this "visually unspectacular" work is vital to the regeneration of the town and also very complicated.

She added: "The delays does mean the plans have had to be re-jigged.

"We don't have a set time the building work will start, but it will obviously be when the utility work is finished.

"What the delay means is that we could be looking at moving the businesses out of Charles Square after Christmas and that the development work will take place after that.

"That gives them the chance to maximise their profits over Christmas, as one of our main goals is to make sure the town keeps going while the regeneration work is being done around it.

"So while it may look to people like nothing's happening, there is a huge amount of work going on with the utilities and highways work.

Ms Barnett also said BRP was yet to appoint a contractor to do the building work.

She added: "We have not appointed anyone yet, but that will obviously all happen before the work starts.

"Once we get started on site, I can't say exactly when it will be finished, but it won't delayed by a year."

She added the new town centre is now 60 per cent let, with such names as H&amp;M, Marks & Spencer and restaurant chains Zizzi and Nando's already confirmed, and that building in the northern area (formerly Broadway and Crossway) would take much longer than the redevelopment of Charles Square.

She added more announcements about new retailers coming to the new Bracknell will be made in the coming months.